Alex Marlow, Andrew Colvin and Bhatia unarguably one of the most astute political observers in the country, and author of 2nd Class, we talk about their general perceptions, how that mirrors mine, what we re seeing from the focus groups, and what we are seeing in the post-debate polling. We break it all down right here! You re not going to want to miss it. If you enjoy what we do here, if it means something to you, please consider joining memberscharliekirk.org where we give you exclusive access to members-only content. We also let you take part in AMAs that everybody on the radio hears, and participate in AMA's that everybody else hears, as well as let you join in on merch, gear, swag, and swag at our events. So much there to get involved with, so much to do, and so much there's not to miss, you re gonna want to join. . We give you access to all the content that means something to you , including AMAs, AMAs , AMA, AMA AMA-related content, and much more! We also give you a chance to become a Member-only member of the Club, where you get access to everything including the latest and access to AMAs and AMAs-related perks. You ll get exclusive ad-free content. and perks, like AMAs well-prepared for you, the Club gets paid for you! You can t have access to the Club and all of the Club so you can t miss out on all of that stuff. Thank you, - Charlie, Charlie, too! - Thank you for being on The Charlie Kirk Show. - Andrew, I really appreciate you, Charlie Kirk - Cheers, Andrew, Thank you! - Thank You, Charlie and the rest of the Crew, Cheers! - EJ., Andrew, EJ & the Crew. (and the Crew at CHEERS! - - The Besties at CHALLENGING YOU! - Charlie & the Team at CHILLYKIRK CHEER, - THE CHALLENGE AND THE BOYS at CHLARRY KIRK AND THE CHILLIEKKER - ANDER AND THE PODCAST
00:00:00.000Hey everybody, Andrew Colvin in for Charlie Kirk.
00:00:02.000We have all the breakdown from last night's debate that you're going to want to hear.
00:00:07.000We are joined by Alex Marlowe, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News, one of the most astute political observers in the country, and also Bhatia Ungar Sargon from Newsweek and also author of Second Class, We talk about their general perceptions, how that mirrors mine, what we're seeing from the focus groups, what we're seeing in the post-debate polling, and we talk about Trump's best moments, what independents are doing.
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00:02:05.000I have so much to digest now that we have some space between the actual debate, seeing how people are reacting, seeing how independents are reacting.
00:02:52.000Going to bring in the one and only Alex Marlow, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News, one of the most astute political observers in the entire country.
00:03:02.000Alex, honored to be with you as always.
00:03:04.000Also author of Breaking Biden, which ended up being a bit of a prophetic title, if we will.
00:03:11.000Alex, I want to get your top line thoughts.
00:03:22.000Andrew, first of all, thank you for having me on.
00:03:24.000I always appreciate you and Charlie including me anyway, but I feel like the bigger the occasion, the more likely I am to get an invite, and that always means a lot to me.
00:03:33.000I thought overall, I thought there was, and I'm being not literally here figurative, I thought there was a chance Trump was going to put Kamala Harris in a body bag last night, and that didn't happen.
00:04:35.000And what Matt Boyle, our Washington bureau chief, talks about at Breitbart is the demographic he's got his eye on more than any other are men.
00:04:42.000And if you want to drill down on that, white men, working class men, middle class men, and then minority men, all of them.
00:04:49.000I don't know of anyone in any of those subsets.
00:04:53.000are watching what she did where she wouldn't answer a question.
00:04:55.000She's dodging on a late-term abortion.
00:05:06.000She's dodging on so many of the key parts, inflation of the Biden-Harris agenda.
00:05:12.000How are men watching that and then watching her get bailed out by two moderators By the establishment media, by ABC, Disney, who's watching that and think, yeah, I'll vote for her now.
00:05:32.000So this, this to me, I think that's completely spot on.
00:05:35.000I think keeping an eye on men, I've seen some polling recently, Alex, which shows that Trump is winning men by more than he's losing women, which is a huge, huge, Data point to watch in this election.
00:05:47.000But I think last night was so much style versus substance, style versus substance.
00:05:52.000I'm, I'm happy to admit and concede that Kamala probably won it on style.
00:07:30.000Look, of course, when Trump calls her a Marxist, which I dug, and points out her father was a Marxist professor, which I dug, I wish he would have also added, she wants price control, which is literal Marxism, and it doesn't work.
00:08:26.000I actually, you know, it's funny because there is this piece of this debate where we can all sort of look at it and be like, eh, she won on style points, she was a little bit more exact, she, you know, this and that.
00:08:42.000If you look at the panels, the focus groups, um, let's go to, this is a, uh, an image from, uh, Reuters.
00:08:49.000Let's put this up on the, on the screen right now, the Reuters, but this, this is a really telling pool.
00:08:54.000So they had 10 voters undecided Reuters interviewed them six and this after the debate, six out of the 10 are now going to vote for Trump or leaning Trump three for Kamala one remains undecided.
00:09:18.000And we're going to go through some of this tape with you, Alex, of undecided voter after undecided voter, just in these focus groups run by the Net.
00:09:27.000As a matter of fact, let's go ahead and play one from CNN here, Alex, and I'll have you react on the other side.
00:09:33.000Heard that we're abandoning or we're withdrawing from Afghanistan.
00:09:37.000And the way it was happening, I had my Kennedy moment.
00:09:41.000It was very similar to when we decided to invade Iraq back under President Bush.
00:09:46.000And when I saw that we were leaving that amount of high-tech equipment in the hands of our enemy, and later that day or later that week, I saw on the news were them celebrating with our guns in their hands.
00:10:01.000A, in the loss of money that we abandoned when we left, plus the very bullets that we left there that they were shooting at us as we flew away in the planes.
00:10:12.000You see how there's such a visceral reaction that people have to so many things that we've lived through in the last four years.
00:10:51.000Without God, can we ever have a free society?
00:10:54.000And if religion is removed from Washington, who pays the ultimate price?
00:10:57.000There's a new movie out called God's Not Dead, In God We Trust.
00:11:01.000The story of a small-town pastor pushed into the political arena to run against a powerful regime, forcing faith and religion out of American politics.
00:11:10.000There's no better time for this movie.
00:11:11.000In today's divided culture, all of this upheaval and yearning for spiritual leadership is America's collective scream to keep God in the forefront.
00:11:18.000God's Not Dead challenges mainstream liberals in the battle for spiritual leadership, hope, and faith in America.
00:11:24.000Watch it with your family and friends.
00:11:26.000And remember the words of Ronald Reagan, without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.
00:11:34.000God's Not Dead challenges mainstream liberals in the battle for spiritual leadership and hope and faith in America.
00:11:40.000Don't miss God's Not Dead in God We Trust, a Pinnacle Peak production in theaters September 12th.
00:11:47.000What did you see that brought you to a conclusion?
00:11:51.000I think it's important to remember that we are voting for the leader of our country and not who we like the most or who we want in our wedding party, but who is actually going to make our country better.
00:12:03.000And we're in an incredibly unique situation where we've had both of the candidates in office before and we've gotten to see what they would do.
00:12:10.000And when facts come to facts, my life was better when Trump was in office.
00:12:14.000The economy was higher, inflation was lower.
00:12:17.000Things were better overall, and now with Kamala's administration, things haven't been so fantastic.
00:12:24.000And she's saying she can fix the problems that her administration has caused, but I just don't know if I can afford to take that risk.
00:12:32.000That clip is so gold, I want to frame it somehow.
00:12:36.000We're back with Alex Marlowe, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News, one of the most astute political observers in the country.
00:12:46.000The media tells us Trump lost, he got demolished, the talking heads say this, and then these panels, these focus groups, we get a much different picture.
00:12:55.000Yeah, I think that clip, by the way, Andrew, was literally what was on my screen when you played it, because I mean, how could you get enough of it?
00:13:05.000And I'll tell you, if there is another debate, I don't think there will be, but if I'm wrong about this, and I've been wrong before, that Trump is going to have an opportunity To really emphasize some of this stuff, if it comes up, if they try to bring up his crowd sizes again, or she tries to do these little tricks to try to get under his skin again, he can say that, look, I'm not going to talk about that.
00:13:24.000What I'm going to talk about is how gas prices are whatever it is, 2x whatever they were when Kamala Harris took office and when he left office.
00:13:33.000And why are eggs prices what they are, and bread, etc.
00:13:36.000And run down the list, say, I'm talking about that today.
00:13:38.000I'm talking about how you guys bought the Afghanistan pullout.
00:13:40.000I'm talking about how Putin invaded Ukraine because of you guys.
00:13:43.000And I'm not talking about crowdsizing.
00:13:45.000And if he does that, then he's going to bring a lot more people in, and he might get another shot to do that.
00:13:51.000But your question, I'll let the New York Times answer it.
00:13:59.000Twitter is not real life most days of the week.
00:14:02.000People online who are giddy and jubilant about this debate for Harris, they are not the people who are the ones who are having a much harder time balancing their checkbooks under the Harris-Biden administration than they were under Donald Trump.
00:14:15.000And that is a big, big elephant in the room here.
00:14:18.000What do you think about the analysis, you know, we're going to have Rich Barris on, but he tweeted out basically that, you know, the elephant in the room here is that Harris just wasn't that likable.
00:14:28.000How big of a factor is it, do you think?
00:14:30.000I mean, prosecutors are performance artists, right?
00:14:34.000That is probably her strongest suit, right?
00:14:38.000You don't look at her and think you see somebody formidable with a lot of substance and a moral core, but she's able to sort of act the part when she needs to.
00:14:48.000Rich doesn't think she's very likable.
00:14:50.000How much is that playing into this with kind of the squishy middle?
00:14:55.000Yeah, I love this point, and it's something that I'll tell you, Andrea, it's important to see what your favorite commentators are doing, but always take your friend's temperature on this.
00:15:04.000Take your family member's temperature, and I'll tell you what I'm getting texted from people who do not work in this industry today.
00:15:09.000It is that Kamala Harris was not likable, particularly for men, but also women, too, saying she was not likable, and others who are pissed off at Taylor Swift for dividing their household.
00:15:19.000Because they've got a daughter who likes Taylor Swift, and they're diehard Trumpers, and they don't want to have to have an uncomfortable conversation because a singer wants to endorse someone because she's being pressured by Variety magazine to do that.
00:15:32.000That's what I'm getting my email traffic on right now.
00:15:35.000We don't like Harris, and why is Taylor Swift putting me in this horrible position?
00:15:39.000You know, on that Taylor Swift note, you know, we have some Swifties on our team.
00:15:45.000Emma and Daisy, you know, they keep us in the loop on all of this stuff.
00:15:51.000Their take on the Taylor Swift endorsement was that it was actually even think to bring it up. It's gonna get lost and buried.
00:16:03.000She also said do your own research. She didn't say hey you need to need to build
00:16:08.000Kamala and you know I think my take on it is she realized she became the story
00:16:12.000and she became very polarizing when she was too loud on this topic and so she
00:16:16.000wanted to do something a little bit more...
00:16:19.000under the radar, a little something that would would go away in a couple days. And I just don't
00:16:24.000think she liked it because she knows she does have I would say 40% of her fan base is probably
00:16:28.000conservative voting for Trump. And she was also pictured with Brittany Mahomes, which was a big
00:16:33.000question mark. Oh, yeah, a lot of the pop observers, she chose to still be associated with
00:16:39.000her. So it could have been a lot worse. Yeah, how many families just put up $3,600 to go see
00:16:44.000the Eros tour. And now they have to have this conversation about Taylor Swift's polarizing and
00:16:50.000It's just, yes, they put it at a specific time to minimize the damage it's going to do to her career and try to at least get on record because she has to.
00:18:20.000So I'm honored to be here in the absence while he's working on one of those.
00:18:25.000Okay, so here's my sort of my take on the debate.
00:18:29.000I think Kamala Harris was the clear winner and Donald Trump the clear loser.
00:18:35.000However, I think the things that made Harris win last night are the things that would make her a worse president.
00:18:42.000And the things that made Donald Trump lose the debate last night are the things that would actually make him a better president.
00:18:49.000And the things indeed that made him such a great president Between 2016 and 2020.
00:18:54.000And what I mean by that is this was a debate put on by and for the elites.
00:19:02.000The questions, the moderation, being so clearly biased, the setup, everything about it, the topics covered, and the way it was being judged based on aesthetics and demeanor and all of these things.
00:19:18.000There was nothing really that was covered That the 60% of Americans who are struggling and wondering if they're going to be able to pay their bills next month could really hang their hat on and say, here is how what's coming out of this person's mouth is going to end up as money in my bank account.
00:20:21.000And Donald Trump had to take on the elites in his own party.
00:20:26.000When he did all of that for the American people, and no doubt the elites in his party were also telling him, keep it together, stay calm, you know, give the policy, stay with that stuff, which was advice.
00:21:39.000What's interesting here is, uh, I think again, style over substance, I think people are just sort of like, Hey, Kamala, are you going to change anything?
00:23:29.000We are seeing a phenomenon, Bhatia, that we have not seen since 2016, where independents are tracking almost in lockstep with Republicans, moment by moment, as they're watching the debate itself.
00:24:13.000And while most of the voters that we spoke with agreed stylistically with Kamala, they said that she sort of performed better than he did on substance, on the issues on economy and immigration, they really resonated with him.
00:24:26.000And that was really what we were talking to a lot of the independent voters.
00:24:28.000And we saw that right there with that line.
00:24:30.000What's your take on what we're seeing with independents right now?
00:24:34.000There was very little daylight between independents and Republicans and the instant reaction to these clips.
00:24:41.000I think that was really fascinating and it reflects something I've been saying from the beginning of the campaign, which is if you just look at where Donald Trump is on in terms of policy, every position he has eked out reflects where 60-65% of the American electorate is at.
00:24:59.000Whether it's abortion, whether it's immigration, whether it's tariffs, whether it's foreign policy, Donald Trump is running a consensus campaign, and he would be seen as the unity candidate if not for the very, very biased media, which of course we all saw was on full display last night.
00:25:20.000Trying to portray him as an extremist.
00:25:23.000And to me, what that says, when you have independents tracking with Republicans, when Donald Trump is talking about the economy, something you cannot fake voters on because they know what their bill is when they check out of that grocery store.
00:25:37.000That reflects to me what I've been saying, which is that he is dead center.
00:25:43.000And their attempts to portray him and cast him as an extremist are really failing.
00:25:48.000Yeah, he is the sort of candidate of common sense, and especially now that we have this strong endorsement from RFK, there is this sense that he is a unity party candidate, and they can't really fudge the economy issues because, like you said, every time A voter goes to a grocery store and they see the price of eggs.
00:26:07.000Every time they fill up their gas tank and they see the price of gas.
00:26:10.000These are almost built-in advertisements for the Trump campaign.
00:26:14.000And I want to go back to something I talked about with Alex Marlow just before you came on.
00:27:08.000But so for the first time in many, many years, he was exposed to sort of Liberal punditry while we were waiting for the debate to start, you know, the ABC liberal pundits.
00:27:19.000And at one point, one of the women said, you know, well, Donald Trump has called Kamala Harris dumb.
00:27:24.000That's not going to go well, you know, for for women voters.
00:27:36.000And I thought that was really, I laughed really hard, obviously, but it's true.
00:27:39.000I mean, I don't think a lot of women, you know, if you are a very well educated, wealthy woman who has been through the sort of same track as Kamala Harris, who, as we know, has kind of failed up from job to job to job, You probably do identify a little bit with, you know, snubs about her intelligence or what have you, different insults about that kind of thing.
00:28:01.000But I think for a lot of women, you know, they don't look at someone like Hillary Clinton with all of the privilege and the immense wealth and the way that she carries herself through this world.
00:28:29.000And I think we should all recognize that because clearly the Democrats have realized how alienating that is.
00:28:35.000There was one very funny moment when she said, can you imagine these women who get pregnant and then they have to get on a plane and sit next to a stranger and go somewhere else to get an abortion.
00:28:49.000My husband and I looked at each other like, when's the last time she was on a plane?
00:28:54.000Like, we all have to sit next to strangers.
00:28:56.000That's not some sort of civil rights violation.
00:29:03.000You were one of the first that kind of He said this and it hit me that Trump is sort of a New Deal Republican.
00:29:09.000And you see that with this working class adoration, this support that he has that seems to be so resilient, so firm in his corner.
00:29:19.000And that even I would say a debate night where he wasn't on his A game and yet somehow he got his message through because it still hits almost viscerally with working class people.
00:29:52.000And it's funny, somebody said to me last night, well, he's too focused on the past.
00:29:59.000But the past is where his record is, right?
00:30:01.000It's where his successful record is, where he can point to and say, you know, the years of 2016 through 2020, before the pandemic, those were some of the best years that working class Americans can remember.
00:30:16.000They will point to specific Trump policy that put money back in their pockets at the end of the month.
00:30:23.000And honestly, some of those things the Biden administration has kept like the tariffs on steel and aluminum and other tariffs on China.
00:30:31.000And that was one of Trump's best moments of the evening, in my opinion, was when he said to Harris, If tariffs are a tax on the middle class, why did you keep my tariffs and why don't you get rid of them now, right?
00:30:44.000And you could see how frustrating it is to him that she's both taking credit for the things he did that worked and then also promising to be the agent of change, right?
00:30:57.000So she takes credit for his successes and then promises change from Biden's while pretending to be a continuation of Biden.
00:31:27.000Donald Trump made a strong closing statement by saying, why didn't they do all the things that she's proposing during the three and a half years that they've been in office?
00:31:39.000And Biden did this entire moderate stance back in 2020, and she's trying to do it again in 2024.
00:31:48.000She didn't talk about her policy changes between 2020 and 2024.
00:31:52.000Her whole centrist, moderate stance is just a facade.
00:31:59.000Is this going to move the needle for either side?
00:32:02.000I don't know how much of it's going to move the needle, but I will say the proof that she's unlikely to do anything different than Biden is in a question, which is who is running the country right now, right?